A research project of
Academy of Finland
Abstract
Overall
objectives of the project are:
(i) to develop an integrated modelling system for simulating and forecasting
in time the pollen emissions and transport on an European scale; and
(ii) to evaluate the spatial distributions of pollen emissions and
concentrations in Europe.
The
project will concentrate on:
(i) the development, evaluation and implementation in numerical model of a
unified parameterization of the birch pollen emissions over Europe;
(ii) the modelling of the characteristics of pollen grains (as a special
case of atmospheric aerosol);
(iii) the utilisation of the satellite and ground-based data for improved
real-time modelling of pollinating seasons;
(iv) the numerical simulations of the regional and continental spatial
distribution of airborne birch pollen in Europe; and
(v) the evaluation of the accuracy and reliability of the developed
modelling system, by comparing model predictions with the phenological and
aerobiological, and other available experimental data. We have selected
birch pollen as the first example pollen species, due to substantial health
effects for the population, and its ability to be transported over
substantial distances.
The system will be based on
the Finnish Emergency modelling system, SILAM,
and will include also various phenological models describing the pollinating
seasons of birch.
